Current State of Bridging VST Plugins (32bit to 64bit) for Ableton Live 10+

[Bl1tzor]

Hello,

I've recently come back to making music after quite a while off. One of the disappointing things I've found while coming back is that some of my favourite 32-bit VST plugins are no longer supported in my DAW of choice (Ableton Live 10) and it seems like most other hosts are also dropping support for 32-bit plugs. This is a shame as there are some real old school gems that don't have modern equivalents or 64-bit versions.

In trying to find a solution for this, I've done a lot of digging over the past few days and unfortunately for Windows users at least, there is no solution that "just works."

The following are the 4 I found so far, and they all have their issues

jBridger - Tested demo version, converted a few of the 32-bit plugins in successfully but all either had performance problems or crashed in Live
Bridgewize - Tested demo version, Live crashed before opening when trying to access the converted plugins
NetVST - website is down and there are no mirror links, but it's still accessible from archive.org, however some of the documentation is unavailable & I haven't been able to get it to work yet (missing .dll issues )
TBridge - a version of NetVST with its own custom code, however many KVR users reported this as having a Trojan or other virus and therefore I have not tested it.

All of the other solutions I've found are either "use a different host" or "it's for Mac only"

Am I missing anything? Have any of you found solutions for this problem in Live or similar DAWs that only support 64-bit plugins now?

Thanks in advance for your replies

[zeep]

Hi, i can tell you from experience that jBridge works great for all 32 and 64 plugins in Live 10 and 11. I too experienced some plugins crashing or having performance issues at the start, but they were 100% solvable with jBridge support. There are a lot of settings you can do for bridged plugins to fix any problem. Most common issues are noted on his website with a fix. If need be, he is very helpful in emails too. I have bought it both for pc and mac. I can't speak for the other programs you posted, but jBridge is great and the support from the dev too.

[jackoo]

Maybe some word of advice:

It's safer to bridge 64bit plugins to 32-bit hosts rather than vice-versa (but I suppose this is not a must).
If you want to bridge several synths, do not create a bridged version for each.

Use a host (Blue Cat Patchwork or the free modular host Element) and bridge that. Load your plugins within that sub-host. Use the sub-host as a multi-timbral instrument, with different MIDI channels going to different actual plugins.

Bridge only once, and have all your bridged plugins in one bridged host.
jBridge is currently the best. If you want to distribute the workload of the bridged plugins to another core, use performance mode (though that creates an extra buffer of latency, but usually negigible).

Inside jBridge, always pick the option to show the GUI of the subHost in a different window

[Bl1tzor]

zeep -

Thanks for your response. That's great to hear you've had a good experience using jBridge. I've only tested the demo version so far on a few plugins and none of them worked correctly. Obviously since jBridge is a paid product, I'd only buy the full version if I knew it worked in the demo and so far that's not the case. I know it must be tough to support the 1000s of 32-bit plugs out there as a solo developer so that's great to hear the dev is willing to do individual fixes on a case-by-case basis, but going by what I've experienced so far with the demo, it doesn't seem like it's quite at the "it just works" phase yet

[Bl1tzor]

Maybe some word of advice:

It's safer to bridge 64bit plugins to 32-bit hosts rather than vice-versa (but I suppose this is not a must).
If you want to bridge several synths, do not create a bridged version for each.

Use a host (Blue Cat Patchwork or the free modular host Element) and bridge that. Load your plugins within that sub-host. Use the sub-host as a multi-timbral instrument, with different MIDI channels going to different actual plugins.

Bridge only once, and have all your bridged plugins in one bridged host.
jBridge is currently the best. If you want to distribute the workload of the bridged plugins to another core, use performance mode (though that creates an extra buffer of latency, but usually negigible).

Inside jBridge, always pick the option to show the GUI of the subHost in a different window

I'm specifically talking about solutions for using 32-bit plugs in a 64-bit host. Totally happy with my DAW other than the lack of support for 32-bit plugs and just seeing if there are any other solutions I might have missed.

[jackoo]

OK, now I understand the "it just works" part. If you want it to be completely transparent, than like you said, you may enounter some issues, because each plugin may be a little different. In this case, there may not be a universal solution, one size fits-all.

Using one sub-host guarantees that the bridging is always done between the same binaries (the host + subhost), but then it's up to you to correctly instance and route the 32bit plugins in the sub-host. That's how I used it, and perhaps it is the reason why I didn't have any issues: the variety is handled by the sub host, and not the bridger app. If you get the sub-host working, then all the plugins that the subhost supports can now be used in the main host.

[zeep]

zeep -

Thanks for your response. That's great to hear you've had a good experience using jBridge. I've only tested the demo version so far on a few plugins and none of them worked correctly. Obviously since jBridge is a paid product, I'd only buy the full version if I knew it worked in the demo and so far that's not the case. I know it must be tough to support the 1000s of 32-bit plugs out there as a solo developer so that's great to hear the dev is willing to do individual fixes on a case-by-case basis, but going by what I've experienced so far with the demo, it doesn't seem like it's quite at the "it just works" phase yet

Understood. I'd contact the dev and explain whats happening.

[metamorphosis]

TBridge - a version of NetVST with its own custom code, however many KVR users reported this as having a Trojan or other virus and therefore I have not tested it.

Worth noting that this no longer triggers antivirus warnings (https://www.virustotal.com/gui/url/df21 ... e83b2fadb9) and also it contains NetVST inside it.

[umd]

Hello,

I've recently come back to making music after quite a while off. One of the disappointing things I've found while coming back is that some of my favourite 32-bit VST plugins are no longer supported in my DAW of choice (Ableton Live 10) and it seems like most other hosts are also dropping support for 32-bit plugs. This is a shame as there are some real old school gems that don't have modern equivalents or 64-bit versions.

In trying to find a solution for this, I've done a lot of digging over the past few days and unfortunately for Windows users at least, there is no solution that "just works."

The following are the 4 I found so far, and they all have their issues

jBridger - Tested demo version, converted a few of the 32-bit plugins in successfully but all either had performance problems or crashed in Live
Bridgewize - Tested demo version, Live crashed before opening when trying to access the converted plugins
NetVST - website is down and there are no mirror links, but it's still accessible from archive.org, however some of the documentation is unavailable & I haven't been able to get it to work yet (missing .dll issues )
TBridge - a version of NetVST with its own custom code, however many KVR users reported this as having a Trojan or other virus and therefore I have not tested it.

All of the other solutions I've found are either "use a different host" or "it's for Mac only"

Am I missing anything? Have any of you found solutions for this problem in Live or similar DAWs that only support 64-bit plugins now?

Thanks in advance for your replies

If you could elaborate more on jBridge's performance issues you're having or how it it is making Live crash, I will be happy to have a look.